


Reckless

by Annerb



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Gen, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-29
Updated: 2006-08-29
Packaged: 2017-10-20 15:09:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/214080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annerb/pseuds/Annerb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>God save anyone who underestimated Sam Carter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reckless

The only predictable thing about the attack was that it happened without warning. That and the fact it caught the hapless SG-1 square in the middle of it.

In the aftermath the captives were carefully segregated by gender on either side of the compound. For the most part, the armed guards ignored the women, intent as they were on the men, now carefully hogtied and gathered into a corral of some sort, complete with an electric fence (as Jack had unpleasantly discovered a few hours earlier). Daniel was still trying to convince the locals that merely talking to him wouldn’t bring instant death, and through hushed half-whispers and broken gestures he was able to determine the band of ruffians now holding them were slavers, a major menace in these parts the locals had failed to mention.

It had been surprise as much as superior numbers that managed to take down the well-armed SG-1 with embarrassingly little fuss. Teal’c and Jack were a bit chagrined to have been caught thus, but really, there was little they could have done in the screaming chaos of fleeing citizens and crying children in the dark night.

Somehow they had lost track of Sam in the confusion. But as the sun’s light finally began to creep back onto the misty valley floor, Daniel was able to spot the glint of her short golden hair. Sometime during the night she had swapped clothing and now blended in rather seamlessly with the other Nordic looking women. None of them were bound. Most of the women had small children huddled against them, while a few moved quietly through the throng, passing out water and working over low fires. Preparing meals for their captors, Daniel imagined.

As the sun rose fully in the sky, one woman hoisted a ceramic pot on her hip and began moving towards the main tent set up to house the leader of this little band. She paused every once and a while, her head dipping to speak quietly to various groups of women as she passed. It wasn’t until she reached the open space at the center of the compound that Daniel finally realized it was Sam.

Somehow he doubted she was just bringing the leader water.

Daniel managed to forget sometimes that Sam was more than just a brilliant scientist. That was what drew them together in the first place, when Daniel was still perilously adrift searching for his wife, trying to fit in with the military mindset that was so foreign to him. Sam, he felt, understood him. But she _was_ military, just as much as Jack and Teal’c. He found it easy to forget sometimes and not because she was a woman. He still remembered her fight with Turghan, back when he barely knew her, all controlled fury and practiced grace. He knew that she was a better shot than even Jack (he suspected that it might have something to do with her intimate knowledge of the physics of speed and force, not that he’d ever said as much to Jack).

Daniel himself was becoming more of a hybrid as each mission passed, so it bothered him less and less that she didn’t fit into any one mold. The thing about Sam, though, was that she was always surprising him.

As Daniel watched Sam approach the leader’s tent, her face lowered meekly and hips swaying in supinely feminine form, he had to once again readjust his views of this woman. The sleepy, bored guards didn’t even give her a second glance, and for a moment Daniel let himself be fooled that she was just another village woman. But Jack tensed beside him and Teal’c pushed into an unobtrusive crouch. They read something more in her.

It was something uniquely feral that, if the slavers had taken the time to notice, would have surely caused them to shackle her up with the rest of the men.

Sam was in the leader’s tent for less than five minutes before she reappeared, jug abandoned.

She ambled calmly past the first guard and the only warning of what was to come was a flick of her eyes to meet those of her commanding officer. Daniel could just make out Jack swearing under his breath.

The first guard went down with a surprised squeak when Sam’s elbow connected solidly with his nose. He stayed down with a single blast from the zat that she pulled from voluminous skirts. Two more guards fell to zat fire before any of the slavers realized something was going on.

Tugging uselessly at his restraints, Daniel did a quick count. As good as Sam was, he doubted she could take down the seven remaining men by herself. Sure enough, the two men closest to the women’s pens fumbled for their weapons. Before Daniel could open his mouth to warn Sam, large terra cotta pots appeared from the crowd of women behind them, smashing open on their heads. One guy got a cast iron skillet across the face for his trouble.

The majority of the guards suitably distracted, Sam was left to face only three. She managed to zat one before the other two corralled her, one bear-hugging her from behind, knocking the weapon from her hand. Sam struggled for a moment, but the large man seemed to squeeze her even harder, and Sam’s face paled from either lack of oxygen or cracking ribs.

Seemingly sure they had subdued the bizarrely troublesome woman, the other man scolded her loudly, slapping her open-palmed across the face.

Even Daniel could have told them that was a mistake.

Sam automatically went limp in her captive’s arms, and if Daniel hadn’t known any better, he would have sworn she had passed out.

The man who slapped her shook his head in disgust and carelessly turned his back on her, leaning over to retrieve the abandoned zat. That was when Sam attacked. Pushing off the ground, she placed both feet on the kneeling man in front of her and kicked hard, causing all three of them to sprawl to the ground.

The big man lost his hold on Sam when he slammed to the ground. Sam rolled smoothly to her feet, nailing him in the ribs with her elbow as she went.

Daniel, having a few years of off-world adventures under his belt, not to mention the odd scuffle that inevitably happened, never quite understood the type of fighting he saw on movies and television shows. Usually they showed two men beating each other senseless with fists or any other assorted object lying within reach.

Real hand to hand fighting was really so much different. It was more of a dance. With strong, well-trained people like Sam and these guards, it was a really a matter of who got the first good hit in, not the most hits. Even with what must be cumbersome skirts, Sam was fluid and strangely graceful as she constantly dodged and stepped away, intent on finding the one opening that would allow her to turn the man’s momentum against him.

So equally matched were they, the stalemate extended until the winded man on the ground began to stir. Before he could push to his feet a village woman appeared with a large jug in her hands. She held it casually above the man’s head as if daring him to move. He didn’t.

Meanwhile, Sam’s patience finally paid off, and one well placed kick popped the man’s leg in at an unnatural angle, forcing him to the ground. Sam rolled with him, the momentum bringing her back to her feet near the abandoned zat.

She raised the weapon calmly, pointing it at the fallen man. And right before she fired, Daniel caught sight of her face, his breath catching in his throat. Her eyes glimmered with knowledge of her victory and the smallest smirk curved her lip.

This was the Sam that always surprised Daniel. Not the scientist or the soldier, but another person all together. Someone defined by an edge of recklessness that she normally hid underneath her levelheaded exterior. It was the part of her that set off on a motorcycle at a speed slightly past sane, the source of the urge that drove her to fly planes across enemy territory when she could have just as easily sat in a comfortable laboratory somewhere. It was recklessness, Daniel suspected, that brought her to the SGC in the first place.

Sam was a consummate soldier; she rarely let that sharp edge come out to play. Today though, being held captive by slavers who weren’t smart enough to realize that a woman could be just as much of a threat as a man; she let that dangerous side out to play.

Only then did Daniel really understand why Jack had sworn so harshly under his breath when he caught sight of it on her face.

The village women now stood a few paces behind Sam, like a spontaneous army, waiting for her next command. At a mere flick of Sam’s head the women moved forward as a single wave, tightly tying the hands of all the fallen guards and releasing their men.

When Sam finally made it to their side, Jack casually mentioned, “That was a little risky, don’t ya think, Carter?”

There was a time, years ago, when Sam might have taken that statement as a reprimand. Back in the days when she weighed everything Jack said as a criticism. Not today though. Today, she simply readjusted her skirts, smiled brightly and said, “Yes, sir.”

All Daniel could think was God save anyone who ever underestimated Samantha Carter.


End file.
